1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a process and composition for vaporizing metals.
2. Description of the Invention
Detonation of nuclear weapons and devices in the upper atmosphere releases large amounts of metals and other materials that disturb the earth's normal atomspheric and terrestrial environments. The effect of releasing metals and other materials in the upper atmosphere, and the effect of "fallout" of these materials and metals upon the earth's surface is of great concern to man. Hence, numerous and various kinds of instrumentation systems such as communications systems, sensor systems, measuring systems, etc., are employed to control monitor and test the actual nuclear devices when exploding, and the properties of the earth's atmospheric and terrestrial environments before during and after utilizing the devices.
Unfortunately, when the earth's environment is disturbed by the use of these devices, instrument characteristics such as: dynamic characteristics, interference, signal-to-noise ratio attenuation, etc. of the instrumentation systems may also be adversely affected. To design and test the instrumentation systems to ensure that they operate with the reliability they were intended to, it is necessary to create environmental conditions equivalent to those conditions caused by using nuclear devices. However, it has been almost impossible to design and test certain instrumentation systems, for instance, sensor systems, for operational reliability under conditions created by using nuclear devices. This is so because of great difficulties encountered in releasing, by vaporization, metals like aluminum and barium into the earth's environments that could partially simulate the effects of a nuclear explosion.
In addition to the above, there are laser applications where metals that generally exist in a solid state such as: copper, tin and germanium are employed to lase in certain regions of the spectrum by changing the metals from the solid to a vapor or gaseous state. For example, in laser applications where copper is required to lase in the visible regions of the spectrum, it is necessary to initially vaporize solid copper. Some of the present methods require relying on electrical energy to vaporize and lase the solid copper. That is, solid copper is vaporized and the resulting copper vapor is excited by electrical discharge techniques by which the copper vapor is caused to emit coherent electro megnatic radiation in the green and yellow (or visible) regions of the spectrum. However, the equipment employed to create and excite the copper vapor is typically bulky, expensive and difficult to use in the field.
Likewise, new chemical lasers that are based on principles of oxidation of metal atoms existing in the gas phase present similar problems. Accordingly, classes of metals that are required in chemical laser applications (such as: tin, silicon and germanium within group IVA of the periodic table) are solids at room temperatures, and necessitate high temperatures to convert the solid metals into a gaseous state for subsequent oxidation.
The following equations illustrate these principles: Solid Metal + heat .fwdarw. gaseous metal + oxidant .fwdarw. (electronically excited) metal oxide .fwdarw. de-excited metal oxide + laser light or M(s) + heat .fwdarw. M.sub.(g) + N.sub.2 O .fwdarw. MO* + N.sub.2 + MO + N.sub.2 + h.nu.-(laser light).
Present chemical laser systems utilize resistively (electrically) heated furnaces to generate the necessary high temperatures. These furnaces, however, also make chemical laser systems both bulky and difficult to use in the field.
Thus, it is an object of this invention to provide a metal vapor generator and a process for vaporizing metals from the solid to the vapor or gaseous state.
It is another object of this invention to provide a metal vapor generator for releasing vaporized aluminum and barium in the earth's atmosphere to provide partial simulation of the effects of nuclear explosions.
It is yet another object of this invention to provide a metal vapor generator for vaporizing metals which are used as lasing gases in chemical laser applications.
It is still another object of this invention to provide a metal vapor generator and process for utilizing heat energy released during the formation of titanium diboride (TiB.sub.2) from titanium and boron to vaporize selected metals existing in a solid state.